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Monday, March 4, 2019

Gallup Finds Americans Have Been Very Deceived Regarding United States’ Image Around the World

By Eric Zuesse - March 04, 2019 at 09:15AM

Gallup issued on February 28th its “2019 Rating World Leaders” report, subtitled “The US vs. Germany, China and Russia,” and said that “The world still frowned on US leadership more than the leadership of any other country asked about in 2018.” All four of the countries’ leaderships received approval-ratings from people worldwide in only the 30-39 percent range, and this low score for the US leadership (which was approved by merely 31 percent of people sampled worldwide during 2018) represented an enormous decline for the United States, which during the Obama years had received scores ranging from 41 percent to 49 percent approval. However, a Gallup report which had been issued only three days earlier, on February 25th, indicated that the American people are blissfully ignorant of any of this reality, and instead believe that the global approval-rating of the United States itself is high and is rising, not, as it actually is, low and declining.

In fact, on January 18th of just a year back, 2018, Gallup had headlined “World's Approval of US Leadership Drops to New Low”, and this plunge in the global rating of America’s leadership could reasonably cause a person to expect a decline in the American public’s view of America’s national image in foreign countries, but it’s not showing up, at all. The exact contrary is being displayed in the recent data. On February 25th of 2019, Gallup bannered, “Americans' Perceptions of US World Image Best Since 2003”, and reported that “58 percent say US rates very or somewhat favorably in world's eyes.”

This disparity between reality and the public’s view of reality, is clear in the data despite all of these polls’ having altogether ignored almost all of the Islamic-majority nations, where there has long been a very negative view prevailing both of the United States and of US leadership. (The US regime prefers its pollsters to sample mainly favorable countries regarding its public image around the world, and so that is what is done.)

The last time that Gallup surveyed America’s global public image (and this isn’t the world’s approval of US leadership, but approval of the US itself, such as was measured and reported by Gallup’s report issued on 25 February 2019) was in "1991 Feb 28-Mar 2”, and the global public image of the United States was overwhelmingly favorable at that time — 95 percent favorable versus only 3 percent unfavorable — by far the highest of any country rated at that time, though today a few countries are nearly as high as that: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, UK (“Great Britain”), Japan, and Norway, all show nearly as high in Gallup’s global polling now, as America did then.

When Pew introduced their 2018 report concerning this matter, of America's global image, on 2 October 2018 at the CSIS or Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, the first question raised after the presentation was about America’s overall public image, and the presenter, with apparent reluctance, summed it up by acknowledging, at 29:05, “The US is definitely seen in a much more negative light than it was a few years ago. … People [worldwide] are much less likely to express a favorable opinion of the US … By and large on the questions we asked at least, we see much more negative views around the globe.”

One would reasonably expect this fact to be showing up in the American public’s view of how foreigners see America, but it’s not showing up, at all; and, in fact, the exact opposite is being displayed in the data.

Obviously, then, the major news-media that over 95 percent of the US public receive their "news" from have been hiding from the public the realities which are causing this steep plunge in America’s (the American nation’s) global approval-ratings. Whereas the approval-rating of the US went down, the American public thinks it has instead gone up, and only the country’s major "news"-media can be to blame for that extreme US fantasy-world, which is being displayed in the data.

It’s the very same fantasy-world — and for the very same reasons — which overwhelming majorities of the American people believed in 2002 and 2003, when the US regime imposed the fraud that Saddam Hussein was building weapons of mass destruction (“WMD”) and that he supported Al Qaeda. All of the US mainstream, and virtually all of its minor, news-media were stenographically pumping these (even the most blatant) lies to the public, and therefore they’re co-responsible along with the US dictators for America’s having destroyed Iraq. That couldn’t have happened without the propaganda-operation’s compliance.

And America has the same national press now as it did then, though some of the corporate names have changed since 2002.

The ownership and control of America’s major news-media are obviously being very wrongly determined, and America cannot even possibly become again a functioning even partial democracy unless and until that situation — the system for determining the control of the corporations that constitute the US "news"-reporting oligopoly — is fundamentally and permanently (perhaps even Constitutionally) amended.

America’s stenographic press merely uncritically reports the Government’s bipartisan lies (not the Democratic or the Republican Party’s lies, which can and do become exposed, but instead the lies that both Parties spout — the bipartisan lies which reflect the US regime. These are lies such as that WMD existed in Iraq in 2002, and that Russia and not the US is the world’s aggressor-nation seeking global conquest, and that America protects peace around the world, instead of its being the world’s top perpetrator of coups and of military invasions, by far the world’s biggest aggressor).

America cannot become a functioning, actual, democracy, at all, unless and until the ownership and control of its major news-media has become ripped away from the present controllers and also becomes legally fully accountable in honest courts for any propaganda (regime-pumped lies) that it issues. Neither domestic policy nor international policy can be democratic in such a nation. America’s major "news"-media are obviously not trustworthy. Consequently, America isn’t a democracy. (Consequently, this news-report, which is exposing America’s major "news"-media as being instead national propaganda-media, is going to be rejected — not published — by all of them, though it’s being submitted to all of them, as well as to most other US international-news reporting sites.)

The full written 2018 report from Pew is online as “America’s International Image Continues to Suffer.” It opens by saying: “A year after global opinion of the United States dropped precipitously, favorable views of the US remain at historic lows in many countries polled. In addition, more say bilateral relations with the US have worsened, rather than improved, over the past year.”

[19:56] 70 percent say no to “US takes into account the interests of other countries.” 28 percent say yes to that.

[21:53] “Fewer Now Say US Takes into Account Their Interests.” The change (which is since the end of Obama’s Presidency) is -31 percent in Germany, -23 South Africa, -22 Brazil, -19 Mexico, -17 France, -16 Kenya, -16 Italy, -13 Indonesia, -13 UK, -13 Canada, -12 South Korea, -11 Philippines, -10 Japan, and -8 Spain. In Russia, 15 percent said yes to that question at the end of Obama’s Presidency, and that figure then soared to 41 percent in 2017, but it declined to only 26 percent in 2018. Perhaps now it’s again around 15 percent, as more and more Russians come to recognize that the US regime is set upon conquering Russia — recognize that anti-communism (prior to 1991, when the Soviet Union ended) was only an excuse for building America’s global control, an empire controlling the entire world, and that America, after the death of FDR and increasingly since then, is fascist, no authentic democracy at all. This fascism certainly explains Iraq 2003, Libya 2011, Syria 2011-2018, Yemen 2015-now, Ukraine 2014 (a US coup in February 2014 that the regime instead calls a Russian ‘invasion’, which occurred thereafter in response and was no invasion at all, but defensive for Russia, against a fascist regime on its doorstep), and Venezuela 2017-now.

[22:51] “US Perceived to Be Less Involved in Tackling Global Issues.” Percentages saying “less” involved, as opposed to “more” involved, were found in every EU country that was surveyed, except that it’s equal (= percentages), 22 percent saying US is both “less” and “more” involved, in Poland — but nowhere else that Pew was polling in Europe. Basically, Trump’s rejections of the Paris Climate Agreement and of the nuclear agreement with Iran, and his outlawing refugees from Syria and some other nations the US bombed, and his determination to wall-off the US from Mexico, have cemented the global public’s view of America as being a hostile country. But nonetheless, Gallup was able to headline on February 25th, “Americans' Perceptions of US World Image Best Since 2003”.

Gallup’s findings regarding not the world’s favorability toward the US but the American public’s estimation of how favorably the world views the US, were reported there, and opened:

Fifty-eight percent of Americans believe the US rates "very" or "somewhat favorably" in the world's eyes. Though the current figure is up just slightly from the 55 percent recorded last year, it represents the highest figure Gallup has found since 2003.

The increase in the overall figure is the result of an increase in the percentage of political independents saying the US is rated favorably abroad, up eight percentage points, from 50 percent to 58 percent. Meanwhile, the views of Americans identifying as Republican or Democratic haven't changed.

So: America’s non-aligned or “independent” voters are even more deceived about this matter — especially about the stark decline in the public’s approval of America — than America’s partisan voters are.

This Gallup report furthermore says:

At the same time, Americans are fairly upbeat about the country's global image, the percentage satisfied with the position of the US in the world today is also at a relatively high ebb.

Whereas in 2019 Gallup finds that 58 percent of Americans think the world views America favorably, versus 41 percent unfavorably, and in 2018 these figures were almost as high, 55 percent favorably and 45 percent unfavorably, the figures in the very first month of Trump’s being in the White House were the reverse, 42 percent favorably versus 57 percent unfavorably; and, back in 2016 they were 54 percent favorably versus 45 percent unfavorably — almost but not quite as high as today. In fact, the current 58 percent favorably versus only 41 percent unfavorably is the rosiest view that Americans have displayed in these Gallup polls regarding how they think foreigners view the US, extending all the way back to Gallup’s polling on 14-16 April of 2003 — 61 percent at that time thinking the world viewed the US favorably, versus 37 percent unfavorably, and this was just a month after the US had invaded and destroyed Iraq.

So: Ever since America’s Government destroyed Iraq on 20 March 2003, Americans haven’t had a rosier view of foreigners’ opinions of the United States.

Such a deceived nation’s public is, obviously, a reflection of that nation’s ruling regime, both its Government and its stenographic mainstream ‘news’-media, which won’t publish reports such as the present one, because such reports, as this one, would be exposing the deceived public that results from America’s fraudulent and highly controlled (by America’s 585 billionaires) mainstream press. This reality of the press-problem in America is not what they call ‘fake news’ media, but it’s instead the mainstream media themselves that present to their public actually false ‘news’, real lies (that are the official government lies, bipartisan lies), to such a huge extent as to achieve this enormous disparity between the reality and the public’s warped view of that ‘reality’, regarding America’s international image. What’s important here is not this particular news-item itself, nearly so much as it is what that news-item means — what it indicates. What it indicates is enormous.

This news-report is therefore being offered free of charge to all US media to publish, so as to help rectify the rabidly false impression that exists. Obviously, any news-media that aren’t publishing this report are trying to hide this reality — they evidently, and quite clearly, want to continue this particular deception of the public. But the sites that publish this are honest — as any reader here can easily verify by clicking onto this article’s links.